Bucharest & Fuzzy Logic

[Zappa 0]

The unfortunate events at half time in the Steaua stadium in Bucharest last week have somehow managed to lead to a frenzy of overreaction not only from the mainstream Scottish media, but also from sections of the Rangers support itself. During a week of over zealous condemnation of our traveling fans in the Scottish press & media, Rangers fans have been discussing what actually happened on that horrible night in Romania with many fans coming forward with their own eye witness accounts of the events that unfolded. There is resounding agreement amongst these eye witness accounts that what happened in the away supporters 'pen' that night was a direct result of problems instigated & deliberate provocation by the stewards themselves. While this certainly does seem to be the case, one has to question if there are actually grounds for defending fans who chose to confront stewards violently & as we witnessed, even throw the broken seats they'd been asked to sit on in the direction of said stewards. It's a difficult situation for me to address because on the one hand I find myself thinking that the fans who got involved were quite right to do so, since there were quite obviously fans being attacked by the stewards, but on the other hand I can't help thinking that it was also extremely thoughtless & dangerous of them to have lost self control and taken part to the extent that the events could have ended up in a full-scale riot.

 

Thankfully nobody was seriously injured, the problems calmed down & the match went ahead again after half time, but unfortunately it's a 15-minute half time that most of us would prefer had been very different. The televised events have led to a week where our support have been sweepingly branded by certain mainstream media houses as 'rancid bigoted scum' & 'moronic white underclasses' to name only two examples and it's proof of the pudding once again that no matter what starts an instance of trouble that we're involved in, it's us who will be portrayed as the problem, us who'll be portrayed as the shameful one's. It doesn't matter whether it's crazy stewards who are questionably armed with weapons or coppers in full riot gear, apparently football fans are always the ones to blame, chastise & punish when some trouble breaks out. You'd think we'd have learned this by now though. It's not as if it's a sneaky wee secret or something that's cunningly been kept from us in a plot to lead us to our doom. We should all know fine well that there's one set of rules for the people & a different set of rules for the people in positions of authority in this world. Every single one of us knows exactly what the outcome will be & who the eventual winner & loser will be if we clash violently with people in authority whether it's stewards at a pop/rock concert, Police in a town or city center on a Friday or Saturday night or a bunch of weapon wielding stewards at an away football match in Europe. The outcome will invariably be very similar & something along the lines of they win, we lose. It very rarely matters to judges or disciplinary panels who started it, who provoked it or roughed up who first. If you get involved you get involved & you either put yourself in jeopardy or someone/something you represent in jeopardy. In this case a small number of people have put not only themselves, but Rangers Football Club in jeopardy to an extent that none of us will know until the outcome of our hearing by UEFA's disciplinary panel tomorrow on the 12th November.

 

Something which I find disturbing is that sections of our support are calling for the resignation of our assistant manager Ally McCoist. In actual fact they're calling for a public apology OR resignation from McCoist after he was questioned in interviews at the weekend about what happened at half time in Romania. At Ibrox on Saturday, Ally McCoist hit out at those involved in the incident when asked about it, calling them “mindless idiots” who have “brought shame on the club”. Harsh words from Super Ally? Maybe, maybe not. Should he have commented on the fans involved in the incident at all? Maybe, maybe not. The fact of the matter is though, that we've got a disciplinary hearing coming up & McCoist despite being a fan himself, is payed to coach, look after & represent the best interests of the team & also to represent the best interests of the club. Well, sorry to break the bad news to those in dismay at his actions, but it's not in the best interests of the club for McCoist to defend anyone who goes to an away match in Europe & decides to start throwing seats because of some problems with the stewarding or because of the poor conditions of the stadium, no matter how serious the problems or provocation were. He might tell you something different in private if you know him personally, but when it comes to discussing these issues with the media in public, it's to be expected that McCoist would say what he did in my opinion. I don't see any need for public apologies from McCoist & I don't see any need for calls for his resignation. What about some public apologies from those who chose to throw seats & other objects in Bucharest instead? Not going to happen is it?

 

Some people are too quick to get involved in trouble when it sparks, too quick to criticize the club when it condemns them for it & not so quick to apologise to the club or their fellow Rangers fans when their poor behavior brings the club into disrepute & the risk of sanctions from UEFA. It seems that the only logic involved in this mindset & the others which inhabit all things involved in these situations is rather fuzzy.

Edited November 11, 2009 by Zappa

[Frankie 8,402]

Good article mate of which most I largely agree with...

 

The McCoist issue is an interesting one. I do think he spoke out too early and there does seem to be a culture at the club of condemn first; find out facts later. At the same time though, would we rather we denied there were some idiots obviously involved in the Manchester and Bucharest incidents? That would only make us look worse IMO.

 

However, I do think we could box a bit clever on the media/PR issue as a whole to ensure the club and supporters are defended first and foremost.

[Frankie 8,402]

PS: I'll put this online tomorrow...

[Bluedell 5,516]

The McCoist interview certainly annoyed me. He made absolutely no reference to the saftey of the support, and seemed not to care about the fact that a fan was being assaulted, while praising the great jobs that Kenny Scott and the Rangers security staff were doing.

 

Well Ally, if they were doing such a great job there would be procedures in place to ensure that our support were being properly treated. The fact that they weren't resulted in the trouble, and Kenny Scott and the club as a whole have to take a large part of the blame for what happened last week.

 

There are mindless idiots in our support, but abdicating responsibility over procedures to keep them under control has resulted in this problem, and the club themselves are as culpable as these idiots, and McCoist's simplistic views also damage the club.

[Zappa 0]

The McCoist interview certainly annoyed me. He made absolutely no reference to the saftey of the support, and seemed not to care about the fact that a fan was being assaulted, while praising the great jobs that Kenny Scott and the Rangers security staff were doing.

 

Well Ally, if they were doing such a great job there would be procedures in place to ensure that our support were being properly treated. The fact that they weren't resulted in the trouble, and Kenny Scott and the club as a whole have to take a large part of the blame for what happened last week.

 

There are mindless idiots in our support, but abdicating responsibility over procedures to keep them under control has resulted in this problem, and the club themselves are as culpable as these idiots, and McCoist's simplistic views also damage the club.

I have to disagree Bluedell. Unirea themselves are being brought up on charges by UEFA specifically related to the fact that arrangements made in consultation with Rangers staff in preparation for the match were not adhered to. That's not to say that more couldn't have been done by our own staff, but they definitely seem to have a cushion when it comes to the dishing out of blame.

 

Getting back to Ally's comments, I find it very difficult to see any logic in asking him to make an apology never mind hand in his resignation. The man is paid as an assistant football manager, nothing more, nothing less & he's certainly not paid to defend or swerve the subject of anyone who discredits Rangers FC by getting into trouble abroad - no matter who started it. It's not about who started it, who threw the first punch or anything like that. It's about Rangers fans going abroad & managing to avoid trouble, no matter what the provocation is. That's what we need & what the club want to see because the charges against us are mounting & the club can not afford to be thrown out of Europe or told to play X amount of games behind closed doors.

 

Ally McCoist only said what a lot of other Rangers fans think about the incident, but I agree with Frankie that it could have been approached more cleverly. Obviously Coisty expected to be talking predominantly about football rather than about the trouble in Romania, so he should probably have been more prepared for that.

[maineflyer 0]

The fact is McCoist made his usual knee jerk response to premeditated questioning from the media. He swallowed their agenda hook, line and sinker - failing completely to take a balanced perspective and in the process allowed the media to substantiate their rush to condemn Rangers.

 

Rightly criticising McCoist has nothing whatsoever to do with ignoring or denying the moronic element who cause trouble whatever the circumstances. It's about McCoist and an oversized mouth coupled to his undersized brain. Personally, I'm getting sick of his willingness to accommodate his media pals at our expense. Fast becoming an ex-legend.

Edited November 11, 2009 by maineflyer

[biggordy 0]

I'm sure McCoist is still learning the ropes with regards diplomacy and press statements. After all, I don't think Walter was very forthcoming on the episode.

The Arsene Wenger "I didn't see the incident" etc kind of statement would have certainly have put the incident to bed, as far as Rangers' verdict was concerned.

Bain, as well, should learn to keep his thoughts to himself at least until he knows all of the facts.

[andy steel 0]

Very thought provoking. Unfortunately, the thought it is provoking atm is that we have to accept beatings and whatnot, grin and bear it. I can see the sense but stone me, that's hard to do in practice. I'm as big a wuss as you'll find but if someone is thrashing me I fancy I may resort to hitting back. As Zappa writes, no doubt I would be the one punished but that's not really in your thoughts at the time, is it?

 

All I can think of just now is only going to games in northern Europe and bodyswerving anything south of France and east of Germany.

[bmck 117]

i honestly think the press are just a bit smarter than ally, its all part of his apprenticeship. i let the mrs read tannochside_bears account earlier tonight (i should never have got the intenet in the house, i will never finish this essay) and she said "if they are going to start spraying stuff at people its them who have to live with the consequences - people who get sprayed with tear gas for no good reason retaliate". few people are going to sit and take that, regardless of the consequences, even if they are far from hard. but i think the main point of the piece that calling for allys resignation is just silly is right. if he had said "if i were in the crowd i would have done something similar" he would have pleased the support for two seconds and dragged this chirade of a witch hunt out even longer. uefa will do what they do, and we will do what we do, and on it goes. this has never happened at ibrox where we evil hordes congregate in the biggest numbers - whats the difference? the polis here arent stupid enough to use pre-civilisation crowd control methods. nonetheless, the tearing up of seats and that cant go unpunished, regardless of the rights or wrongs or justifications because thats how life is. the moral posturings of the morally bankrupt media aside - its like at school, you punch someone in the face, you will get into trouble regardless of the provocation because the rules are the rules, but you dont feel bad about it or lose any sleep. ally, because of his job, is one the teachers side now, and sometimes it involves stuff like this. he should have said no comment probably, but thats it.

[andy steel 0]

Oh btw, when we have a fan owned club, I bagsy Eponymous Archon first.